


Tony in a Box

by LlmFr



Series: Magpies are both good and bad [2]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Assassin Tony Stark, Canon-Typical Violence, Child Abuse, Choking, Howard wtf I doing involving the kids, Hydra Tony Stark, Incomplete, Kidnapping, Murder, Violence, Winter Soldier Tony Stark, four years ago and didn’t really bother editing soooooo, i wrote this like, legit I didn’t realize how many there were until I was thinking of tags, not sexually I mean there’s a few scenes of kids choking, outline, this is really dark but also badly written.
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-11
Updated: 2020-12-11
Packaged: 2021-03-10 20:29:08
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 4
Words: 2,853
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28003176
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LlmFr/pseuds/LlmFr
Summary: December 16th, 1991. A seven year old Tony got dragged into his father’s impromptu road trip...I think we all know how it ended.(See further AU details in series description. This work is not and will not be completed by me but if anyone would like to straight up take the plot, be my guest. Just link me cause I’d love to read it. No it’s not drastically different from other HYDRA Tony stories but still...)
Series: Magpies are both good and bad [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2048414
Kudos: 24





	1. Masked Man

Howard and Maria were in the front arguing as usual. Tamer perhaps, but nontheless a fight about when to stop and how important is it not to stop on a 13 hours drive which should’ve been done by plane but Howard insisted on the scenic route for whatever reason. ‘Deadline’ he claims but he was given leave a week before.

Tony was simply in the back silently rooting for his mother and looking out the window at the rare sight of snow. His arms tucked right around his legs and head leaning on the icy glass with a sardonic air.

That is, until he herd the loud rumbling of a motorcycle on an otherwise deserted road. A loud and sudden rumbling.

When he looked back he saw man on a motorcycle tailgating the car and felt Howard accelerate. He looked suspiciously between his father in the drivers-seat and the company. When the speedometer hit 80 miles his mother got nervous and began to notice the rumbling. "Howard. Howard, what’s wrong?"

Before he could answer, the loud burst of a wheel popping reverberated about the car and the car swerved hard. Tony herd an ungodly screech pierce his ears and his seat had a distinct burning sensation. When he glimpsed from the edge of his window he saw bright yellow sparks. Tony gripped the back of his mothers headrest and screamed. He could visibly see his father weighing taking his foot off the gas, glancing up and down the dash. An almost frantic calm settled as he bit his lip and handled the out of control wheel, determined to keep accelerating even as the tail of the car skidded on the asphalt. His mother could barly be herd screaming and yelling for him to stop, pulling at his thigh with white knuckles but leg unrelenting.

And when it all went black, when the story could only be continued in his dreams, mind trying to make sense of what happened, he’ll claim years later it must’ve been an hour of pure helpless terror until the sound of crunching filled his head. And when newspapers say the rock that popped the tire had only been 100 feet from the crash site he’ll scream blasphemy because no matter the number, they could do no justice with their ink. No justice to what the little forgotten seven year old felt in the backseat, never to be seen again for years.

Tony’s moment of clarity before the pain hit was just fear, fear as he watched a stranger so close to him with a mask straight out of a horror film and an accompanying metallic screeching as he gripping the suitcase next to Tony. When the pain hit his vision blurred, from what he doesn’t know but as he watched everything play out his neck felt too weak to hold his head and his skull was throbbing.

He foolishly attempted to grab the case back but the sheer wave of nausia from the movement made him collapse on his side with the seatbelt gutting him.

When the man in the mask rounded about to the front seat and tore his father from the car. He could only watch dazed as Howard muttered ‘Sargent Barns?’ Only to have his face caved in just in view of Tony’s seat and that horrid metallic sound yell even louder with every hit.

Maria gasped and moaned grief as her dead husband was laid almost lazily back into his seat with blood still streaking warm down his face. A disgusting wheeze sounded when the man nudged his chest and the cars’ other occupants where horrified. Tony struggled to set himself back up as he stared at his father’s remains settle into the seat, blood staining the expensive leather and face grotesque.

The man then turned to Maria who began to struggle out of her seat with little success, the door and seatbelt jammed. Tony closed his eyes when the enevitable wheezing and crack of her neck sounded and was only able to sob when the pain became too much. When everything became too much and he gave up because he knew he was next.

And for a moment he allowed himself to bask in his very last thoughts when finally his door was ripped from its hinges.

And then he let himself sleep.


	2. Out the Trunk and into the Light

He felt his freezing toes before he felt the low rumbling of the ground or the throbbing of his head. His eyes as if they were glued shut and his whole body heavy, stiff, and sore. For a moment he thought he’d fallen asleep in the car, his parents’ fighting finally, at the least, in small whispers. Maybe Maria noticed he’d fallen asleep and kept quiet cause of course Howard wouldn’t. Maybe he got too comfortable leaning on the window while a speed pothole came by and that’s why his head hurt. Maybe he scratched himself on the seat belt and that’s why his neck stings. Maybe everything’s just how he left it.

And then when he opened his eyes he saw nothing but black.

He honestly wished he could dream right then.

For a few minutes he simply stared breathing hard through his nose like he did when he played Hide-N-Seek with Jarvis, something icy in his stomach as the masked-man went about his head, as the sounds of his father’s skull on the side of the car echoed in his ears thinking the same man might be just outside.

The arm, so surreal he could almost trick himself into believing that maybe this isn’t what he thinks it is. That his parents didn’t die and that he isn’t being taken somewhere by men he could hear in the front with no faces. That this is some surreal nightmare and tomorrow he’ll be hit with inspiration by that cold metallic arm and revolutionize prosthetics to make everyone proud.

He can almost bring himself to tear up through the fuzziness in his head. Only almost before he rolls back into the warm unnatural grogginess.

When he feels the car stop it doesn’t feel real.

When he hears the men arguing outside he doesn’t feel real.

When he sees lights flutter along the cracks of the trunk it doesn’t feel real.

Really, it isn’t until the trunk pops open and he’s blinded that he even begins to comprehend what’s going on.

He sees a blur of three people and before he can even get a grip on their faces he’s tugged out the trunk by rough hands. His arms bound and legs strung together like a prisoners.

He’s barely gotten his bearings when the man on his arm shouts in rough english, "On your knees!" and throws him down onto icy wet soil.

Fear crawls up in his throat when he lifts his head up and is blinded by headlights, small silhouettes intermittent with tall looming figures. Kids who must’ve been something from five to fifteen, just like him, with dirt and tears smattered on their faces that he imagine is on his face too, some dried and others newly dirtied. Adults by their sides like sentinels with guns on their hips and raggy clothes. None of them speak and when one of the girls —ten maybe— to his left attempts to plead, the man stationed next to her swiftly throws her down into the icy soil. And when she struggles for air you can hear the scratchy wheezing that comes when she’s actually breathed in the dirt, her bound hands searching for purchase as she cries for help between gulps of air. You could hear the others’ breath quickening and see their eyes redding with tears but no one dared make a sound, the older ones looking away while the younger bury their faces in their dirty palms staving off tears.

He could hear the men behind him whispering in German to others but didn’t dare turn around. Sometimes he caught of a bit of the French and the Russian they occassionally switched to but otherwise it didn’t make any sense.

"— _pick ups taking—"_

_"—bounties—"_

_"—Gustav— Fillimer Tech’s—"_

_"—tried to get away—"_

_**"—Stark—"** _

_"—HYDRA is —"_

_"—rich—"_

_"—gone—"_

Something snapped him out of the fog in the moment when he finally connected the dots that he wasn’t even here for ransom. His parents weren’t here. They wouldn’t pay it. He was here because they wanted an eight year old for who knows what, not Tony Stark. He had no issurance or something to look forward to. The Stark’s are _gone._ Tony Stark has disappeared. Dead. All those years he spent learning and elbows deep in gears working to impress everyone. The press. His family. His _father._ It’s _all_ gone and somehow that hurts more than actually losing just his parents. Somehow invalidating all his work snapped him irrevocably and he felt a sob bubble up harder than ever before.

Then he felt his nose dig into dirt and a muddy boot on his neck. He struggled hard against the rubber, his hands slipping on the soil. He yelled and choked when dirt shoveled into his mouth and sobbed when they let up. When he didn’t stop they grabbed him by his collar, choking him, ripping something.

He was let down after a few seconds. In the moments of him catching his breath, a piece of cloth was bound tight around his mouth. It felt like he was choking all over again, the metallic stale taste of the dirt on his tongue and his throat scratchy.

"You stay quiet." Warned the man behind him.

He continued to sob, screeching almost, when he realized they tore up his own shirt to gag him and shivered when a breeze hit his exposed stomach.

Tony raised his eyes to see the others staring in fear when a loud rumbling in the distance sounded.

_When he looked back he saw man on a motorcycle tailgating the car and felt Howard accelerate—_

They all turned when two headlights shown in the distance, the clanging of cargo characterized by a truck following echoed in the trees. An eighteen-wheeler rounded the group before stopping just outside the circle, the rear towards them opening to reveal two men with large guns armed in their hands and holding open crate. The men shouted something in Russian he didn’t quite catch before Tony was yanked up by his shirt along with others and lead to the crate. One by one they were thrown into the dark abyss, restraints tangling together in the tight space, each tripping over eachother when a gun was shoved at the last kid’s back. They had barely a moment to settle before it was pitch black and silent. The only way you knew you weren’t deaf was by the harsh breathing of each child smartly staving panic.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’d like to reiterate. 
> 
> NOTHING HAS BEEN EDITED
> 
> I say this because some of the stuff I post here could be anywhere from 100 to 2000 words so if you’re holding out for an update, don’t expect much. I’m literally going through my notes and pasting everything from finished chapters to footnotes. 
> 
> Not that I think anyone will be invested enough to actually hope for more but if you’re just cruising around desperate for Hydra Tony stuff, then I guess you have a 5 minute binge now?
> 
> I’ll be posting most stuff randomly but I guess semi-frequent.


	3. Black Box

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kids in a metal crate

The metal lining the inside of the crate rubbed sharply with Tony’s back once he shuffled over the bodies of the other captives to the wall. Noise bounced loudly on the walls, ringing the disgusting sound of sniffling and whining kids no older than ten.

"I want to go home, I want to go home, I want Nini!" A little girl cried in the corner bordering on a tantrum, kicking at the walls and trampling over the others with her little feet. The older ones must’ve been only-children because after a while a fed up girl around thirteen grabbed the five year old and slapped a hand around her mouth. The little one struggled and screamed under her hand, muffled and downright horrific. The others scooted away in the cramped space to avoid the kicking, a strange atmosphere mixed with fear and wariness to the others fell.

The younger ones began hushing themselves up with their knees and shirts when the thirteen year old wrapped her legs around the kid and pinched her nose. When it got quiet it Tony could hear her chanting under her breath ‘Be quiet’ with an unhinged and terrified expression on her face.

Seconds passed and he noticed the five year old’s struggle unnaturally fading.

"Stop it." He croaked weakly. She didn’t.

Another girl, must have been older than ten piped up in a horrified whisper, "She’s not breathing." And an unsettling commotion rose, everyone looking to eachother.

"Stop it!" And he couldn’t help but refer to those psychology books Ana gave him of the Bystander Effect.

Finally an older boy crawled over and ripped her wrist away from the five year old and threw it to the wall. The little girl slumped forward in a heap, a corpse if it weren’t for the weak rise and fall of her back.

"What is wrong with you?!" The boy yelled.

"I- I, she wouldn’t- she—" One of the others turned the girl over to check for breathing.

"She wasn’t breathing! You were choking her!" He looked about ready to punch her when she started to cry.

"I- I didn’t think she was just so loud and-and- and people are dead! I’m not crazy! I just- do you- does anyone! Anyone know what’s going on?" She looked downright hysterical, her face having the gall to get angry at the other boy.

"She’s a kid! She’s going to fucking cry! You think she would if she knew what’s happening?! You think killing her is going to give you answers?!" He grabbed her shirt, throwing her against the wall with a loud thump that had Tony covering his ears to stave off the ringing and _crashing_ noises. He screwed his eyes shut and just wanted it to _stop._ The tension in the crate brought more screams as their yelling progressed.

"I wasn’t going to kill her!" Tony could hear her struggle against him.

"You came close to it!"

"But she wouldn’t shut up! She wouldn’t stop and she was just making this all worse!" The floor began vibrating as she kicked her legs, trying to lift them from where he was likely straddling her legs.

"Then you calm her down—"

"But she wouldn’t! Just kicking and screaming and crying and I just kept thinking that all this going on can’t there just be a moment of _silence._ No more guns and shooting and those- those fuckin—" She choked back an angry sound like a sob when she began yelling all over. "My parents are fucking dead! They killed them! Just shot right in front of me and there was blood on the papers and Miss Venhoff screamed and it just- it just wouldn’t fucking stop- an- and everyone’s just dead! And that- that fucking brat is crying over her nini?! A fucking blanket?!" She spat at the unconscious girl, hissing a vicious anger that drained over her tears when the others tried scooting the five year old into a secluded corner.

"I’m not- just a moment of silence- just..." She broke down crying into her shirt, the boy looking at her conflicted before getting off, letting her curl up and cry into her knees mumbling ‘they’re all dead’ and ‘I’m sorry’ over and over again.

In a way Tony is thankful when an eerie hush falls over the sobs.

* * *

"A- are we just going to sit here and sulk?" She finally says.

They had been sitting for a while then. The atmosphere cold and hard. Everyone was afraid to break the silence, instead preferring to sleep or simply stare at their feet. Tony himself had taken to counting in his head with his eyes closed. Maybe it had been a few hours. 8,578. 8,579. 8,580. He lost count a few times so it has likely been longer.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’ve read a bunch of stuff that touches on some nasty topics but for some reason this scene grosses me out. Idk. Maybe it’s because it illustrates panic in such a flat and plot serving tone instead of as a means of development? At least that’s what I got from the thirteen year old. Not that these characters were going to end up in the background making this scene moot. They were all gonna pop back up or become friends or double agents but at this point I don’t know what purpose this scene serves other than being filler 
> 
> If you’re curious, the paragraph after the cut off was supposed to be an opening to everyone introducing themselves and the girl trying to scramble together SOME plan. Everyone kind of shuns her or stays out of her talk but she ends up sparking a debate with one of the other kids about the merit and dangers of fighting back. Tony is pretty passive in this scene but he does throw in his two bits he learned from Jarvis about being kidnapped which kind of leads everyone to introducing themselves.
> 
> Also, this probably serves no purpose besides villainizing the thirteen year old, but “Ni-Ni” was actually in reference to the little girl wanting her Nanny, not her blankie. That was just some fact that I kept in my head years ago when writing this.


	4. The Room

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Three different settings/transitions that don’t actually have dialogue.

Hours passed before the loud clanking of the metal door sounded in the crate. There’s was a sudden hush, everyone afraid of being the first dragged out scooted as far away from the door as possible. Light shown through the cracks as the crate door was pried open and the first man came into view adorned in black and notably a gun holstered his jacket with another pointed in his hand.

"вылезать" The word ‘Out’ came to his mind when the man spoke. 

No one needed to know the language to get the message.

Everyone scrambled out, twelve counting kids eagerly looking out to see the world again after what felt like days deprived of light inside the cold crate.

.................

They were all tossed into the room one by one by their corresponding and ever-so-kind chaperones. Whatever spell kept the children quiet —likely the hope they would all return home at some point— was broken when the iron-cased, windowless room was locked from the outside. A boy who looked thirteen

.................

They left them all sitting in the room with no other company than eachother until they were all skeletons. In the beginning there was only prolonged sobbing. The young-half of the girls and boys curling up into balls, sometimes in the arms of the older, crying for mother or father, brother, sister, Alfred, Augustine, Sebastian, Nanny.

Tony found out rather somberly the little girl, her name Kadison, who cried for her ‘Nini’ couldn’t pronounce Nanny without slipping some ‘i’s into there.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The first paragraph thing was supposed to be a whole ass scene about the kids wondering about what looks like a military base and Tony trying to pick out who’s actually behind this. Being the tiny eight-year-old that he is, he actually latches onto one of the older boys who were talking earlier and they start whispering to each other and developing some rapport. He and this character were supposed to become close in later chapters along with the girl in the last chapter.   
> However, once they reintegrated back into civilian life, they have drastically different dynamics which I was going to play with once Tony begins to outwardly show his allegiance, rather than the passive aggressive radio silence he had before iron man. 
> 
> The other two paragraphs were actually alternate openings of each other. The first was going to be in depth and place the reader right next to all the characters and have them learn information as they probe around and the second was a kind of omniscient perspective with Tony as narrator. The second glossed over everything and I wrote it because I realized the first would’ve been REALLY boring and unnecessary.


End file.
